


Aftermath

by victoriousscarf



Series: War and Tulips [2]
Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Gen, wwi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-08
Updated: 2012-10-08
Packaged: 2017-11-15 21:17:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,013
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/531819
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/victoriousscarf/pseuds/victoriousscarf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Germany meanwhile finally gets his act together to be a supportive brother. (Of course, no matter how optimistic this ends up becoming, don't forget that WWII is right around the corner.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Aftermath

Prussia had been playing the flute ever since he got back from Austria’s. Germany hadn’t asked why he was going to the house of someone who couldn’t stand him at the best of times, let alone now, he had just nodded and let the other leave.

They really hadn’t been talking much lately.

He wondered if he should feel bad about that, but his brother had never really given him any reason to worry. In fact, Prussia had only gotten haughtier and less open since the end of the war. He had come back from the front and had locked himself in his room for a day. When he came out, he would barely speak to Germany and had gone to the Peace Conference nearly mute.

Standing by the doorway and watching his brother play the flute for the last couple hours, Germany began to think maybe he should have tried to get his brother to talk to him harder. Maybe even ask him why he had brought Tulip bulbs back from Austria’s of all things. Instead, he didn’t even try to talk to him now, and just listened to his attempts at music. Prussia would never be a good flute player it was true, his motions too jerky and he couldn’t keep up the right flow of air, but he tired hard. He’d been trying hard for hundreds of years.

Stumbling over a note, Prussia dropped the flute and started cursing at it. “God damn IT!” he yelled at the instrument. “Can’t even play his favorite song,” he muttered, and his face crumpling up, he bent down to pick up the flute, putting it carefully back into its case. Germany noticed the fact there were other small dents in the instrument, probably from previous episodes like the one before.

Prussia turned around and jumped a little when he saw his brother standing in the doorway. “West,” he said warily and Germany almost let himself cry at the caution in his brother’s voice. What had he missed in the last few months?

“Are you alright?” he blurted out.

Prussia rocked back on his heels and put his hands on his hips. “Sure, fine.”

“Don’t give me that,” Germany growled, suddenly angry. He had been angry a long time but this was just it. He’d been so caught up in everything and how hungry he was, and how much everyone hated him, he hadn’t even been paying attention to his  _brother_. Who had always been skinnier than him, and now looked like he’d lost another good twenty pounds which he could ill afford to do. He actually looked like he would flinch back if someone raised their hand to them, and Germany could not wrap his mind around the idea.

“What do you want me to give you than?” Prussia demanded. “I gave you,” he started and then snapped his mouth shut.

“What?”

“You don’t want what I can give you,” Prussia muttered, looking at the wall instead of Germany.

“Why not?” Germany asked, surprised and still angry.

“Because what have I ever given you?” Prussia yelled. “A country? Advice? Neither of which…” he swallowed. “Neither of which…”  Germany shook his head.

“No,” he said. “Whatever you’re thinking, no.”

“No?” Prussia’s hackles were raised. “This was all my fault!” The supposed revelation left Prussia a bit breathless. “This entire war, all the pain and suffering and the things they did to you—”

“They did to you too,” Germany protested.

 “But if I had never… if I had never been the one to raise you, if I hadn’t pushed to encourage Austria to start the war, if I hadn’t…” Prussia’s head drooped.

Germany stepped forward and rested his hands on Prussia’s face. “Do you think it was your fault?”

“Of course it was,” Prussia mumbled. “Austria kept giving me to line that it was all of our faults, but I was the one, I was always the one…”

“How much of what they tell you do you believe?”

Prussia huffed. “It’s not just them, though… they hate me now.”

“They hate me too,” Germany said, keeping his voice calm in the hope that it would calm his brother as well.

“France hates me,” Prussia said quietly. “He was so angry after the last war, but I told him it was payback for Napoleon and than we laughed and it seemed like it would be okay, but at the fucking conference, which wasn’t a peace conference at all, it was a bitch fest he, wouldn’t even look at me. He just walked past me and shoved me aside into a wall. They don’t know what to make of you. They know what to make of me and they…”

“They don’t hate you.”

“Except they do!” Prussia yelled. “They’re all right with you, because they blame me and you…!”

Germany stepped forward and wrapped his brother in his arms before he could protest or finish his sentence. “Whatever you think, don’t.”

“What they did to you, what they’re doing to our country, it’s my fault,” Prussia mumbled into Germany’s shoulder. “And I’m—”

“It wasn’t your fault,” Germany said again, tightening his grip a little, as if the physical motion would make Prussia actually believe him. “I don’t even care what anyone else thinks, I believe it’s not your fault, I would never blame you, and  _I_  don’t hate you.”

“I’m sorry,” Prussia said, his face buried into Germany’s shoulder.

“ _I’m_  sorry,” Germany said in reply, looking at Prussia whose head had snapped up in shock. “It’s not one or the other’s fault. It’s not even just ours. And it certainly wasn’t just you.” He smoothed a hand down Prussia’s back. “Things are going to be different now. The world is a different place, and war itself has changed. But we’ve survived a lot, haven’t we? At least, you have, and you’re here to protect me, right?”

“Right,” Prussia mumbled, his face buried in Germany’s chest.

“See?” Germany said, smiling for the first time in what felt like a lifetime. “We’ll be alright. I can protect you now.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> A follow up on Prussia's end to War and Tulips


End file.
